


Angels Cry, Too

by rage_quitter



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Character exploration of Mercy since Blizzard won't do it, Friendship, Hurt/Comfort, Mental Breakdown, Mentions of Pharmercy and Genyatta
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-21
Updated: 2017-08-21
Packaged: 2018-12-18 01:53:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,972
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11864187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rage_quitter/pseuds/rage_quitter
Summary: Genji comes upon his dear friend in a breakdown. He does what he can to help her through.





	Angels Cry, Too

**Author's Note:**

> hey michael chu can we get uhhhhh mercy character development  
> i'll do it my damn self i guess smh  
> also good ol friendship! lov some of that mlm/wlw solidarity!  
> i cranked this out in like two hours because i love angela and want more mercy lore so sorry if there's typos or anything lol

“Doctor?”

Angela sat bolt upright, her eyes going wide. They were horribly shadowed, the dark circles under her eyes cast into stark contrast to her too-pale skin, touched blue with the light of her computer.

“Genji,” she said, her voice a touch hoarse. Her smile was too bright, unnatural.

Genji’s fingers tapped uncertainly at the doorframe and he looked at her with concern he knew she couldn’t see. “Are you alright?” he asked at the same time that he spotted the half-empty bottle on her desk, an inch from her fingers.

She blinked a few times. “I, ah… yes, quite alright,” she said. She was lying. “Do you need something?”

Genji heard the waver in her voice. It was one he knew well; a catch in her voice that he had heard so many times from Jesse, from his own brother. She was not sober. “Everyone is worried about you, Doctor Ziegler,” he said gently. “This is the third time this week you have skipped a meal.”

“Oh. I didn’t realize… it was so late already.” She frowned a bit and reached up, trying to fix her hair. “Well, it’s okay.”

Genji straightened and stepped into her office. The door hissed closed behind him. Without the hallway light, the room was mostly dark, illuminated only by her computer and the neon green from Genji’s body. “I do not wish to offend, so please excuse my language, but that is complete bullshit, doctor. You are not doing well. What is wrong? Do you need help?”

Her eyes were wide. A deer caught in the headlights? Was that the expression Jesse used for such occasions? It seemed apt, at least. “I… appreciate your concern, Genji, but really, I’m fine, I—I’m just a little busy, that’s all.”

“A little busy?” Genji crossed his arms. “You have hardly left since you got here. You almost live in the medical bay. You are on so many calls, and, well, I am no professional on the nanite technology, but I assume that is what you have been working on so much. What is going on?”

Angela swallowed and looked away. “Nothing that will hurt anyone,” she said.

“It is hurting you, though. You… do not take this the wrong way, but you look terrible. Have you slept at all?”

Angela’s fingers tapped nervously. “I… yes.”

“Please do not lie, Doctor.”

“…No, not really. A little. I… I have so much work I need to do, Genji.” She sagged back in her chair and grabbed the bottle on the desk. Lit by her monitor, Genji recognized it as Jesse’s favored whiskey. Likely stolen from him? “I have been doing calls with other doctors throughout the world, trying to improve the nano-medical technology that I developed while working for Overwatch. Overseeing delicate operations and surgeries remotely, sharing… some information that we… had recorded regarding cybernetic enhancements.”

Genji tilted his head. “Like mine.”

“… Yes. Like yours. But not… not the same, I promise, not like you. To save people. To… to keep them… alive.”

“Doctor,” Genji said softly. He approached her desk and pulled a chair over to sit across from her. He reached up and with a quiet hiss, removed his faceplate. “You did save me.”

She shook her head and didn’t look at him as she lifted McCree’s whiskey bottle. She grimaced at the taste when she lowered it. “I didn’t,” she whispered.

Genji held out his hands, palms-up. “I am alive today because of you.”

Angela stared down at her desk for a few seconds. Then, very, very quietly, she spoke. “Genji… when we were operating on you… you died.”

Genji stared at her.

She took a shaky breath. “You were hardly alive when Blackwatch found you. I thought, at first, it might just… be better to let you go. But Commander Reyes, he… always had a thing for picking up orphaned delinquents.” She laughed, a note of hysteria in it that she couldn’t hide. Her fingers trembled on the bottle. “Which is why he wanted my team and I to save you. And… well, once you were stable enough and conscious to consent… we had no choice. I had no choice.

“And we began operating. You already know all of this. But you died.” She raise her head and gazed at him with piercing eyes. “I stood over you, putting wires and metal into your body, and I heard the heart monitor go flat at the same time that I felt your heart stop under my hands. You were dead. And I just… something snapped. I looked at you. You looked too young. I have so much blood on my hands, Genji… I couldn’t let you die. I didn’t let you die.”

Genji felt hyperaware of every cell, every wire, every piece of metal and plastic that made up his body. All of these pieces that worked together in tandem, keeping him alive, keeping him whole. “You saved me,” he repeated.

She shook her head. “At what cost? You were alive, yes, but… I don’t need to tell you how you were. The pain… the anger…”

He nodded. Little of that bitterness and rage plagued him now, but left ugly marks on his soul that even his dear teacher could not cure. “But I did not stay that way. I am here now, a new man.”

“It’s so much more, Genji,” she rasped. Angela swallowed twice and hissed at the whiskey. “You are one of so many… so many… lives. So much blood that has stained my hands… my flesh should be red from it by now.”

He frowned in confusion. “You are not a soldier, though. Don’t you… don’t you save people? You are a doctor. What do you mean?”

She hiccupped and brought up her legs into her chair. “I am a soldier, Genji. Combat medic… I’ve been on the front lines of war. I’ve seen it myself. What it can do. War ripped my parents from me. They didn’t…” She took a shuddering breath and cradled the bottle in her arms. “They couldn’t save my parents. They didn’t have the technology. I built everything… everything I have made was so no one else needs to know what it’s like to have a closed casket for both of your parents. To know that the people you love suffered horrible, painful, slow deaths, because they just could not be saved.”

“Angela…” Genji murmured. “I’m so sorry.”

She shook her head. “I held so many people as they died,” she said, so distant. She was miles and years away. “I felt their hearts stop as I tried to plug their wounds. Heard their pleas. Watched them cry as the light left their eyes. Heard their dying words. The ones who knew they would die, telling me to tell their loved ones… their children, their spouses, siblings, parents... I felt their blood go cold on my skin… so many people that I could never save, no matter how hard I tried.”

She let out a sound that startled Genji until she did it again. She was sobbing. Her eyes were dry. It was a dry, ugly crying. Her face was red, her eyes hooded and bloodshot, her fingers shaking aggressively, her hair disheveled. She was far less sober than he had thought. “I felt like a failure. I still do. I’m a doctor. I’m supposed to save people. But I can’t… I couldn’t… I wasn’t good enough. I’m not good enough. Even if they lived, it was… they weren’t the same.” Angela turned to Genji, almost too intense for her distraught condition. “I wanted you to be whole. To be human. I wanted all of you to be just the same as it was, but I wasn’t good enough. And you suffered for it. For my failure. I’m so sorry, Genji, I’m so—I’m so sorry.”

Genji leaned forward. “Angela,” he said, pleading, not sure what for.

She sniffled.

Moving fast, as he always did, Genji stood and went to her. He never went behind her desk, but he did now. He leaned down and after she didn’t move away, wrapped the doctor in a somewhat awkward hug.

After a moment, he felt her shift, and one of her hands reached up to wrap around his arm, all she could reach. Angela pressed her face into his shoulder and shuddered.

“You are not perfect, Angela,” Genji said softly. “And that is okay. No one is. You are such a good person. You try… you try harder than anyone I have ever met to help people. You give up so much for others. Your selflessness is awe-inspiring. Everything you do is for other people, and you bring such light and hope to everyone. I did not see that when I was with Blackwatch. I… I may not have the same ability to read other people like Zenyatta, but I can sense such goodness in you. It is much like his.”

Angela sniffed again and let out a half-hearted laugh. “From you, that is a compliment,” she said hoarsely. “You care so deeply for him.”

“I care about you too,” he said. “In a different way. But still, I see you as more than a doctor. You are my friend. You are a hero. We all look up to you, respect you. Especially Fareeha, you know.”

She ducked into his chest a bit more and he laughed gently at her fluster.

“You try so hard. But you must rest. You have to take care of yourself, Angela. If you stretch yourself too thin, bend yourself in too many ways, you will break. The weight of the world does not weigh on your shoulders. We are here to share that burden. There are hundreds, thousands of people out there who are working to make the world a better, safer place. It is not your sole duty to do so. You cannot let yourself feel responsible for everyone who dies. We all die, one day. It is the order of things. It is not your fault. You must rest. If you overwork yourself and drink all of McCree’s liquor, you cannot help anybody.”

Her fingers tightened against his arm for a moment before relaxing. “I suppose… you have a point…”

“If you require help relaxing, I am sure Zenyatta would be happy to give you advice on meditation, perhaps? Or… would it be a bit inappropriate for me to recommend the help of Fareeha?”

Angela let out a scandalized giggle. “It is quite inappropriate!”

He laughed along with her. “My apologies, then, Doctor. But really… am I wrong? I am not so rusty in my people skills that I cannot read the looks you share.”

“When I am… in a better state. Perhaps I will be more able to… do something about it.”

“A good idea.” Genji pet a little awkwardly at her hair. “You need your rest now. Do you want something to eat? Some water?”

“I have some things in my quarters. Sleep… may do me well.” She moved, and Genji drew back to let Angela cap the bottle and place it on her desk. “I should return that to McCree…”

“I can. Do not worry about it. Let me walk with you.” Genji replaced his faceplate and helped Angela to her feet.

“You are so kind, Genji. Thank you,” she murmured as he helped her stumble through the dark room.

She couldn’t see his smile, but he hoped she knew it was there. “We are friends, Doctor Ziegler. I wish the best for you.”

As he closed the door to her quarters and began to head to the room he and Zenyatta shared, Genji knew he would have much to speak with his dear friend about later. But for now, she would be okay. And that was enough.

 

**Author's Note:**

> come stop by my tumblr @sapphiccowboy! (was rage-quitter)


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